Stained
by the shadow proves the sunshine
Summary: Edmund looks at all the blood on his hands.


**Stained**

**Summary: **Edmund looks at the blood on his hands.

**Disclaimer: **The usual applies. I don't own the characters or their world either. Only in my dreams. And even in them I don't own it, just get to play in it.

The beginning takes place in Prince Caspian, but it's not really relevant to the story, I don't think. Furthermore, I'm not sure if the tenses work. I knew from the start that the non-flashback part would have to be in present tense to come off the way I wanted it to, but when writing the flashbacks I couldn't decide between present tense and past tense. I hope the way I settled it works. Since I changed tense so much, I'm very sorry if I missed a verb or two and left it in the wrong tense. I read through this story many times, but it's easy to not catch every little mistake, though I tried.

Simple breaks in the story are symbolized by --, while flashbacks are off-set by //, as well as italics that locate the time of when they happened.

--

He looks down at his hands. The blood stains had dried awhile back, and as marred as they are, he can't bring himself to wash it off his hands. It is not just blood, but human blood. It could easily be his, except he knows it isn't.

Edmund had fought many battles before, having gone to war often in Narnia. He had fought against both beast and men, but for some reason this battle was affecting him more than usual.

Whenever they had fought for Narnia before, it had been against evil creatures and fallen men. However, so many of these men that he had fought against today- they were neither evil nor completely fallen, but simply misguided. They thought they were being good soldiers, good countrymen, by following their leader into battle, even if it meant their deaths.

He glances back down. The feeling on his hands is slightly familiar but mostly new; a sticky sense of blood and dirt and even physical fatigue mixed together on his flesh. The feeling in his heart, he realizes, is almost as old as him; the wonder and the guilt and the sickening sense that he should have done something to prevent this. It is a feeling that accompanied him much at the beginning of his time in Narnia, but the love and support of his family and his kingdom and most importantly, Aslan, had caused that feeling to fade.

Until now. He had almost forgotten what it felt like, and now he wishes he didn't remember.

The first time he can remember this feeling, this sense of all the blood on his hands, it had been his own life at stake.

//

_1__st__ year of Narnia's Golden Age, approximately a week after the coronation_

Edmund glanced down at the feast before him at the table. He lifted his fork to eat, but he wasn't hungry, not really. He's wasn't _anything_, and he hated that fact. What he would give again to feel something, anything, but this, this. . . _abyss. _It s a sickening feeling, or perhaps a sickening lack of feeling. He's not sure.

As soon as dinner is over, he slipped away to his room, to his cage. As soon as he arrived, he buried his head in his hands. He doesn't want to be like this anymore, he really doesn't. He's been given his family back, and he wants nothing more than to be around them, constantly, to be crushed in Lucy's embraced and graced by Susan's smile and get a nod of approval from Peter. That's all he wants, but he feels like he'll never get it, because he can never get it. He knows he has his family's love-but that's just it. He doesn't _deserve_ it, and they certainly don't deserve him.

Edmund wants what he thinks he can never have. That's always been true, he mused it over in his own head. He wanted power from the White Witch for the specific reason he never thought he could have that kind of power before. Now, he realizes maybe he doesn't want it as much as he thinks.

"Ed?" A soft voice at the door asked. Edmund gripped his sheet and blankets beneath his fingers tightly, not turning around. Of all people, it has to be Peter. _Peter. _Probably the one that suffered the most at Edmund's action, and yet here he was, in Edmund's room.

Edmund didn't say anything, didn't move, but he also didn't tell Peter to go away, so Peter takes it as the closest thing to an invitation he's ever going to get this particular night. Peter walked softly across the stone floor until he was standing right beside where Edmund was sitting.

"Ed?" He asked again. Edmund tried to open his mouth, tried to speak, anything, an apology, just even perhaps a hello, but while his heart is overflowing with words, his brain finds none.

Peter took his place on the bed beside Edmund, and Edmund could see a few silent tears roll down Peter's check. Oh Aslan, not this, Edmund thought to himself. After everything Peter's been through, the last thing he needs is for Edmund to hurt him even more.

"Why won't you talk to me, Ed? I'm sorry I drove you away, I'm sorry I wasn't always the brother I should have been, but. . . is it really necessary to punish me such?" Peter asked, the anguish and anger and hurt all shining clearly through his voice.

Peter thought Edmund was punishing him? Whatever for? Edmund wasn't sure he could speak yet, but was able to shake his head at Peter's general direction. When he finally gathered the courage to talk, he was surprised to find his voice was hoarse, as if it hasn't been used in a while. Edmund then realized it hadn't been used in awhile. At least, not in any way it really mattered.

"Why do you want to talk to me?" Edmund countered. His voice was trying to be as soft and discreet as possible, but it came out louder and more harsh than intended. Peter, taking Edmund's words the wrong way, took this as a defensive gesture and stood to leave.

Peter was almost at the door before Edmund could speak again. "I wasn't punishing you." This time, his voice was as soft and gentle as he meant it to be. Peter rejoined him on the bed.

"You've done nothing for me to punish you for, Peter. It should you punishing me, that's the way this should go, but you're not. Why? Why do you want to hold me close to you and the girls, after everything that's happened? Why do you want a traitor for a brother? Why do they want a brat for a King?"

Peter glanced down at his boots, not sure if it would be safe to attempt eye contact with Edmund yet.

"You made a mistake, Ed. We all do." It's probably not helpful, and it's probably not what Edmund wants to hear, but it's all he has.

"A mistake?" Edmund replied incredulously. "You call willingly betraying Susan, Lucy, You, Aslan, and all the Narnians a simple mistake? It's not as if I said something rash in an argument and then simply had to make-up for it later. I sold _you. _I sold _myself."_

Peter looked at Edmund ferociously, no longer caring about being polite. "Perhaps you did. But we- everyone you betrayed- love you. You apologized, and I know you'll be a great King. You need to stop punishing yourself. Ed, what you're doing to yourself is worse than anything I, or any other in this castle could do to you! The only person unwilling to extend forgiveness towards you is _you._"

It's meant well, and Edmund knew it, but as Peter left, Edmund glanced down at his hands and can't get rid of this feeling, this nauseous that it's all on him. The mistakes, his life, it's all on him and he's not sure anyone can wash that away so easily.

//

He moves his hands laboriously, methodically, under the water of the basin in front of him. His hands are already red and irritated from where frenzied scrubbing did no good- now he works slowly, a finger at a time, trying to wash away the blood and dirt and toil and tears all combined on a few inches of his skin.

The water seems to do so little to combat the mixture, Edmund half-feels like giving up. The voice in his mind that sounds suspiciously like Susan won't let him leave the basin until every inch of his hands and arms are clean.

He's on his knees, the sweat still pouring off his forehead. Only within the last few minutes has his adrenaline levels and heartbeat returned to normal. He leans his head on the back of his hands, tired and worn and slightly afraid of what will happen to the land he once ruled and still so dearly loves.

He just can't wash this feeling, this helplessness off of him. If only it would wash away in the water as easily as the dried blood.

Edmund leans back on his heels, glancing around him. The second time he'd ever felt like this, it hadn't been guilt for his own life, but for what the Great Lion he called King had done for him.

//

_Exactly One Year after Aslan's sacrifice on the Stone Table_

"I'm going." Edmund was resolute, and nothing, not even one of his siblings, would be able to convince him to change his mind.

"Why? Why do you want to put yourself through this?" Susan asked. As far as she was concerned, Edmund was deliberately causing himself great anguish and pain. She had thought he had stopped punishing himself- and indeed, he had. It was just none of his siblings could understand why he felt compelled to do what was setting out to do.

"I understand why. . ." Lucy began, but Edmund cut her off with a wave of her hand.

"No, Lucy," he replied softly, "You really don't. Be grateful."

Peter stood, not speaking, just gazing at his younger brother for a minute. Their eye contact seemed to symbolize an internal battle of wills, which Edmund won. Without a word being passed between them, Peter graciously accepted defeat.

"Would you like company?" He questioned. Edmund just shook his head.

"I feel this is something I should do alone." Peter nodded in understanding. Susan looked dismayed that Peter didn't stop Edmund and Lucy looks slightly worried, though she hid it well.

--

He was here, at the cracked Stone Table. It was midday, and the sun shone brightly through the cracks. Edmund circled the area. He felt a sense a reverence, a sense of wonder and awe and the absolute feeling of being *loved* so much that the Great Lion would die for him, but that sense of guilt and remorse accompanied it still.

He dropped to his knees before the table, the mixture of emotions filling him so completely Aslan might as well have been standing in front of him. His left hand delicately traced the cold, hard rock beneath him. In an off-handed sort of way, he wondered how the Stone Table came to be in the first place.

He wasn't sure whether he should laugh out of the sheer joy he felt or cry out of the sheer weight of guilt he felt had been placed upon him. In a way, he was grateful for the guilt, for he knew it would be a reminder for all tempting times to come. But it bore such a heavy, physical weight upon him he wasn't sure he could live the rest of his life with that burden.

_I died to take that burden from you, Edmund_.

Puzzled, Edmund looked around. The Great Lion was nowhere in sight, but it had clearly been His voice Edmund heard. Edmund knew the words spoken were true and liberating, but he also knew that it will not be the last time he will come here, the last time he will need to work through the demons of the past. He had learned, it the past year, that healing would not happen overnight and would be a long and harrowing process indeed. But he had also learned it would be worth it.

Edmund rose back to his feet, a smile playing across his face. He has not been rid of his chains, the guilt and the shame, not yet. But he knew one day he would be, and when that day came, he would embrace it with an open heart for the one that allowed him to have this second chance.

"Thank you, Aslan, for taking these chains from me," Edmund whispered into the calm day, certain that his prayer would be carried to the one whom he addressed.

//

Edmund scrubs diligently now at his face and arms as well. When he is done, he glances into the basin. The once clear, cold water is now warm and sticky, filled more with dust and dirt and blood than pure water. It is no longer fit for any use, so Edmund takes it aside and pours it out. He watches the murky, brown-red liquid slowly seep onto the grass and ground below. He smiles a faint smile as he refills the bucket with clear water so another can use it. The feeling he now feels is parallel to the one he felt that day at the stone table. He flaps his arms, shaking off the excessive water. He glances down at his now-clean hands. The blood has come off them.


End file.
